If they're just going to phone them in like Ni no Kuni II, then I hope they just stop making those games entirely. Might be my biggest disappointment of 2018. Look at how ambitious the ones before it are, then look back at II and all the problems it has and shortcuts it takes. People would be spitting on this game much more if it didn't carry the Ghibli style.

Tetris Effect on the other hand blew my expectations away. Not only did the story mode keep the visualizers interesting and have a large variety of them, but there was a good handful of great music, and best of all they included like over a dozen other ways to play Tetris within the same game with an incredibly polished shell around it all. I expected it to be the kind of game you beat and move on from, but you really could keep playing this game for years, and even longer if they decided to start releasing DLC and turn it into Tetris as a service.

@mbun Yo if you didn't like Ni No Kuni 2, that's fine, but you can't call it phoned in. It's a very fun, whimsical game that has many neat features and mechanics. The overworld missions are fun, the combat, while not hard, is enjoyable, and building the kingdom is immensely satisfying. This is a game made by passionate developers, and to call it phoned in is an insult to the people who poured themselves into it.

I don't understand all of the complaints against the difficulty as well. Why does the game need to be hard? To me the game is good because it is a stress-free reprieve from life - it doesn't have to be anything more than that. The story, while pretty basic, is interesting enough to keep me invested, and the world itself is just magical. The music is good as well.

Well a tie without a clear-cut tiebreaker! I find it pretty funny how both games got the same number of votes at each level.

On Ni No Kuni II, heading into the year, I felt this was one of the higher anticipated games for the first quarter from a consensus standpoint in light of how well the first game was received. But from what I gather, it was either really liked or MAJORLY missed the mark. I remember for PSX 2015 it was probably the big announcement in the second half of that conference (Remember, that show opened with Uncharted 4's unveiling of dialogue and Sam followed immediately by the second Final Fantasy VII: Remake trailer). While a solid take on JRPGs, there's a lot of... for lack of a better way to explain it... weird that turns me off regarding this franchise. I'm happy it was received relatively well, and it outshined more big name games in reception (Sea of Thieves and Far Cry 5 immediately jump to mind).

As for Tetris Effect, I am FASCINATED with this game. The fusion of the classic puzzler and the sensory explosion coming from the creator of Rez make this look so cool. I, however, did not play this because I want to play the best experience possible, and this just DEMANDS itself to be played in PSVR. I don't own the hardware, but this (among other 2018 titles I have a feeling we'll see later) really made VR appealing to me. So, like needing to purchase quality headphones to play Hellblade, I file this under "Games I want to play but don't have the cash/setup for my finicky standards."

But I do agree 19th feels a tad low for it. Goes to show just how strong 2018 was.

I really love Tetris Effect's concept, as someone who's emotionally sensitive to music. The beautiful and mesmerizing visuals is matched with equally effective music, and it all just melts into one hell of an sensory overload. I only got through like 7 levels of the story mode, and i'm already crying and laughing and in awe of the things i'm seeing and hearing. I have no doubt it will bump one of my big 3 games down if i do finish it (and play the extra stuff more), it's amazing what they have done to reinvigorate the Tetris formula.

Also, when will they release the OST? Damn it, i need it so much, easily the best game soundtrack of 2018 for me.

I like Ni no Kuni II because it was a different vibes of RPG. More light-heart and just jolly mood. I would recommend it for 1st timers in the genre and for younger people. Not everything needs to be complicated and all serious because we have enough of those already.

I have mad respect for Tetris Effect. I know I'm not good with those games and it being amazing what I have seen and what people have praised for it just makes me happy.

I have not played a Pokémon game since gen 2 and this nostalgia fest was perfect for me to get me back in the series. I'm thinking about backtracking through the series now to see what I've been missing all these years.

For me Ni No Kuni 2 was a bit of a disappointment. On one hand I liked the changes they made to the combat (although I also felt it lacked a bit of depth), I liked the town builder that you could take or leave for the most part, the little RTS type battles were cool and the world was beautiful. At the same time I also didn't feel as much of a connection to the characters or story when compared to the first game. I feel like I didn't get to know the towns and villages as much as I did in the first either. I hate giving this criticism, but overall I just wan't in to it the way I was with the first and it felt like a slog to get through a lot of the time unfortunately. Its still a lovely game though so it gets an honorable mention and I'm really hoping we get a third!

Ni no Kuni 2 was a game I had fun with... for about two weeks and then I got bored.
It's a sweet game, and it's lack of difficulty was great since I wanted to just relax with it, but the story and characters just didn't keep me interested in playing it. I did prefer the combat in this to the first game though.

Tetris Effect is a game I have not gotten to play, but it got an HM from me based on watching it be played by others. It's amazing, relaxing and that music is phenomenal.

It's a very fun, whimsical game that has many neat features and mechanics.

Absolutely no push back through 95% of battles isn't my idea of fun, and while I agree it should be accessible to everyone, it should offer options to keep people who do seek challenge engaged. Dragon Quest just handled this perfectly with also easy encounters but also the option to opt into the Draconian modifiers for veterans.

the kingdom is immensely satisfying

I don't know why people praise this. You can't even choose where to put things. You're just slowly amassing the exact same kingdom everyone else who plays is building. There's no real choice involved. You're just grinding up a thing that's preexisting. Even mobile games have better kingdom builders than this.

This is a game made by passionate developers, and to call it phoned in is an insult to the people who poured themselves into it.

Hard for me to see them as passionate developers in this instance when the majority of the characters seem like knockoffs of other past Ghibli characters, the voiced dialogue cuts off randomly during interactions with seemingly no cohesion or thought put into it, not only is the combat difficulty snoreville but it is wildly unbalanced to the point where you don't have to think whatsoever for any fight unless it is a boss or those corrupted monsters that are the polar opposite end of the scale suddenly which kind of undoes what good you could say about it being so easy everywhere else, then you have none of the animated cutscenes that originally made the series popular this time, and tie the package together with a very bland mascot character this time around. Yeah I'm not feeling any passion in this one, which is a shame, because I know Level-5 can be passionate. I've seen them do better.

@axel I had a real good time with Torna, so much so that I probably would've put it at my 3 spot easily when I was halfway through this game, but by the end of it some things just tanked it for me compared to other stuff I played last year. Maybe this is my own fault, but I expected more titans and the game to begin in an earlier place than it did. While the game is good at getting you in and equipped with your party, it also brushes over Adam's past and how he meets up with Mythra, which is all stuff I was very interested in seeing for myself after the main game hinted so much at these events. No doubt Torna has some of the best music from any game last year, but sadly it is such a small number of tracks that by the end of it you get tired of hearing the same ones over and over. Those gripes are just small potatoes though, compared to the gauntlet of side quests the game forces you to slog through before you're allowed to reach one of the best endings I've ever seen in any video game, ever. It kills the pace. It makes very little sense contextually. It didn't need to be part of the game. 2018 was just too strong with contenders for me to look past that glaring flaw, no matter how much I love the things this game did do right and personally don't mind doing lots of side quests. Keep them optional. Don't bloat your game.

Outside of it being announced during the direct, I didn't hear a thing about Torna the Golden Country except for maybe I think it was talked about during the Best Music portion of the deliberations. A substantial addition to Xenoblade Chronicles 2 for sure, particularly when the base game has so much in it, it obviously did enough to warrant its place on the list.

@mbun Listen, I'm not gonna try and argue with you, I just have a problem when people try to insinuate that a developer doesn't care. If you don't like how things turned out, or don't agree with with the dev's vision, that's fine, but it's a real crappy thing to do to discount the work of a bunch of people. People who spent an inordinate amount of time making something for the enjoyment of others.

I just have a problem when people try to insinuate that a developer doesn't care.

But what if they didn't? What if this was just a paycheck to them? You don't factually know they cared anymore than I assume they didn't given the quality of the product we received at the end of the day.

it's a real crappy thing to do to discount the work of a bunch of people.

Well, sometimes that's just how criticism works. If the end product is a mess, it is natural to assume there's reasons for it being a mess. We haven't heard any development or budget trouble stories come out yet. Ghibli seemed to not want any involvement making cutscenes this time around either. I really think they just didn't care, probably because a higherup or someone outside the studio made the decision to do a sequel in the first place, and nobody on the team was really enthusiastic about it. That's just my own speculation sure, but that's the best educated guess I can make given what we received.

People who spent an inordinate amount of time making something for the enjoyment of others.

Or maybe they're just devs at a studio making a game they were told to make because that is their job and you're just putting them on a pedestal? Not everyone is blessed to always have the privilege of working on a passion project. Sometimes work is just work, and that is no different in the realm of video game development. Wouldn't be the first time, and it certainly won't be the last. Also, would you really defend criticism aimed at someone in another industry less if their job was less long per project and not in the entertainment realm? Since you have no interest defending the game and would rather preach semantics of criticism, I don't believe there's anymore of a conversation to have here. Guess you could make your own thread if you want to impose your ideology of groups too sacred to complain about, but this isn't the place for it.

But what if they didn't? What if this was just a paycheck to them? You don't factually know they cared anymore than I assume they didn't given the quality of the product we received at the end of the day.

Calm down, dude. Caring about your project is not the same as the quality of the result. I have a lot of issues with the quality of The Missing, but I feel that it was a passionate project for the team. Also many people work on a game, so even if you have some problems with several aspects of the game, it doesn't mean that every member of the team didn't care about results. And there are people who enjoyed this game (including Damiani), so this team must done at least something right.